1998 • Philolsophy and Ethics Award
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TRACY ISAACS

Tracy Isaacs was born in Cape Town but was brought to Canada at an early age when her parents emigrated.  She now lives in London, Ontario where she has been on the faculty of the University of Western Ontario in the department of philosophy since 1992.

Tracy has recently been promoted to associate professor at the university. 
Before joining the University of Western Ontario, Tracy obtained a BA and MA, both in Philosophy, from the University of Toronto and a Ph.D in Philosophy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. 

Tracy became interested in philosophy early in her undergraduate career and decided to pursue this discipline on a professional basis during the second year of her BA.  Her main emphasis is on ethics and she is currently writing a book on responsibility in which she examines the impact of cultural context on individual and collective responsibility. 

To complete her work she has been awarded a research grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. 

This grant, which supports the project for the next three years, will enable Tracy to travel to Australia and Boston to gather research material for her book.  She has already published several articles, books and papers and received several grants for her work in the past. 
Once her current book has been completed, Tracy plans to return to the University of Western Ontario and continue her graduate and undergraduate teaching.

Within the subject of Ethics, Tracy's courses include feminist ethics, introduction to ethical theory, business ethics, moral epistemology, meta-ethics and other, more specialized, graduate seminars. 

Tracy was raised to believe that she could achieve anything to which she put her mind and that receiving a good education was essential to this end.

     She has taken full advantage of this advice but has also made time for pursuits other than study.  Concerned with feminist issues, Tracy took an active role in women's groups at the University of Western Ontario.  She is on the executive of the Women's Caucus, on the President's Standing Committee on the Safety of Women on Campus and chair of the Department of Philosophy's committee on Women's concerns. She also advises a committee on how to incorporate equity concerns in to the University's new collective agreement. 

She has traveled widely, both for business and pleasure and has been to the land of her birth four times.  Tracy looks forward to returning to South Africa to see the changes that have taken place since her last visit there in 1989.